Police have arrested one man and are searching for four others: AFP/Getty

Police in India are investigating claims that a four-year-old girl was gang-raped by five men while she was in intensive care at hospital.

The girl told her grandmother that a hospital attendant and four others attacked her while she was alone on Saturday night.

Mahesh Srivastava, a police official in the northern city of Lucknow in Uttar Pradesh state, said officers had already arrested one suspect – who was now in custody – and were searching for the others.

Detectives have also requested the hospital release its CCTV footage to them.

The girl was being treated for a snake bite and had been in the hospital for four days, Mr Srivastava added.

India has been shaken by a series of sexual assaults in recent years, including the gang-rape and murder of a student on a moving New Delhi bus.